The Tribune

BY ANNELIA NIXON

TRIBUNE BUSINESS REPORTER

anixon@tribunemedia.net

DOWNTOWN businesses are counting thousands of dollars in lost sales, spoiled food and additional expenses as a prolonged power outage on Bay Street and the surrounding area disrupted commercial activity and left tourists facing sweltering conditions yesterday.

The outage, which began shortly after 3pm on Wednesday and continued into Thursday, forced businesses to operate without electricity during one of the capital’s busiest tourism periods, with some unable to process card payments while others were forced to close altogether.

For Mr Pargan Pawar, owner of Taj Mahal indian restaurant, the outage has already resulted in significant losses, with food having to be discarded, staff hours lost and equipment potentially damaged by power fluctuations.

Mr Pawar said the restaurant had been without electricity since about 3.15pm Wednesday, with no advance warning from Bahamas Power and Light (BPL) about the duration of the outage. He noted that repeated calls to BPL failed to provide a restoration estimate or meaningful information about the cause of the outage.

“Without any due notice or notification, that power might be off for six hours or eight hours or 12 hours so that we can staff the restaurant appropriately and take care of the product that is prepared,” he said. “Nothing was communicated to us. All of a sudden, lights went out,” he said.

He said the lack of information made it impossible to determine whether staff should remain at work or be sent home.

“If you can’t give us the time to restore the power, how on earth do I need to conduct my business?” Mr Pawar said. “Can I say close the business down and tell my staff to come back tomorrow? ‘We don’t know.’ So if you don’t know, I don’t know either. How do I run my business?”

The restaurant’s generator subsequently failed due to a previous BPL outage, leaving the business without a reliable source of electricity.

The prolonged outage also created difficult conditions for employees, particularly chefs who live in accommodation above the restaurant. Mr Pawar said that by midnight, the heat had become unbearable, forcing the restaurant to move its chefs to a home in eastern New Providence for the night.

With no electricity, Mr Pawar said food prepared for the restaurant had to be thrown away. He estimated that the combined cost of lost food, labour and equipment damage would run into the thousands of dollars.

“Loss of food and loss of labour time, loss of everything, I’m going to then present it to the BPL,” Mr Pawar said, noting that Taj Mahal had been a BPL customer for more than 20 years and had consistently paid its bills and should in return receive reliable power.

Mr Pawar said the restaurant normally generates between $3,500 and $5,000 in sales a day, meaning the outage had wiped out a substantial amount of revenue.

“People right now are out by the front door, waiting to come inside. We got to tell them sorry, we’re closed,” he said. “People off the boat that come in, we can’t let them in. Can’t even let them in the bar because there’s no air conditioning and it’s hot.”

The impact was similarly severe for other Bay Street businesses that depend heavily on cruise passengers. Ms Colebrook, assistant manager at Luryx, said the business remained open only because it had a power bank capable of keeping its wireless credit card machine operating. Ms Colebrook said the outage had caused a “major impact” on sales, particularly because most tourists visiting the store pay by card. At about 1pm, she estimated the power bank had only another hour of capacity remaining.

“But once that is finished and the credit card machine is off, then we don’t know what we’re going to do because most of the tourists only use credit cards,” she said.

Without a backup generator, Luryx faced the prospect of having to close early With Ms Colebrook estimating about $5,000 in lost revenue due to the outage. She said the situation was particularly troubling given the number of cruise ships bringing visitors into downtown Nassau.

“These are modern times, and we should not be living like this,” she said. “Our business should not be operating like this,” she said. “We have cruise ship in the port every day, even if it’s just one. So, could you imagine the impact it is having on just not us but other businesses that is down here that don’t have a backup generator?”

Ms Colebrook also warned that the experience could affect how visitors view The Bahamas.

“We have to explain to them [tourists] it’s the power company,” she said. “It have nothing to do with us.”

Another downtown retail employee said the outage was also affecting workers’ incomes, particularly those who depend on commissions. The employee said the store had been unable to operate normally because its shutters required someone to open and close them manually.

“We had to call someone and paid them to open it back up,” they said. “That’s $150 each.”

At about 1.14pm, the business had not even recouped the $300 it had spent opening and closing its shutters.

The employee said the store had lost sales from cruise passengers, while the inability to process card payments meant customers could only pay with cash. They noted most tourists travel with card only.

The employee urged BPL to give greater consideration to businesses operating in the capital’s main tourism district.

“BPL got to do better in certain stuff they dealing with, because this a commercial area. This where we decide that we going to make our money,” the employee said.

The prolonged outage also left cruise passengers questioning whether they wanted to spend time in downtown Nassau. Amado, a repeat visitor to The Bahamas, said the conditions had made him reconsider exploring the city.

“The amount of tourism that they have and cruises over here, you would think that they will provide better for the people,” he said. “So we want to see change and better, for everyone, not only the tourists but the people living here,” he said.

Amado, who said this was his fifth or sixth visit to The Bahamas, said he had never experienced conditions like the current outage.

“It makes the time here a lot less,” he said. “We want to go back on the cruise. We don’t want to explore so much. It’s so hot, uncomfortable.”

He questioned why infrastructure appeared to be deteriorating despite the country’s heavy tourism traffic.

“You will see with that amount of tourism and everything, all the boats and stuff, that things will get better for you guys, more electricity, better resources, and it looks like it’s going downhill, not getting better,” he said.

He added: “I see these people, hardworking people. They have to work in this type of conditions. I wouldn’t want to support that.”

Another cruise passenger, who asked not to be identified, described the experience as disappointing.

“Disappointing, because it’s hot,” they said. “We were looking to, because it’s already hot, getting off the ship. So we were thinking we were going to be shopping in the cool. So it was a big disappointment.”

The tourist suggested cruise lines should be informed when major outages occur so passengers can make informed decisions about whether to disembark.

“Just let the boat know that you know you have a power outage,” they said. “So if we decide not to get off, we don’t have to get off in the heat.”